Why are we here?

Recent "drama" in some threads have brought some questions to the forefront of my mind. Why are we here? Why is BP.net here? Why is the staff here? Why are our members here?

Why is BP.net here? Because several years ago, a young man thought it would be cool to start his own forum focused primarily on ball pythons. As the forum membership grew, the overall focus shifted to include any and all herps that interested the members, but the vast majority of interest and experience remained on ball pythons. Because the forum started with such a tight focus and such a small group that grew very slowly...it developed a "feel" to it that was and is unique to Internet Forums. It was warm and welcoming to new people and invited "beginners" to share their first stumbling steps into the herp and BP worlds, rather than shunning them as outsiders or "newbs." It was directly because of this unique welcoming attitude that BP.net began to be successful, with a slow but very steady increase in membership.

Why is the Staff here? Back in the days when BP.net was still run by that original young man, things were far from perfect. Despite the overall welcoming atmosphere, there was a lot going on behind the scenes with arguments and bickering disagreements that would sometimes spill out into public threads. The original owner was very young, and surrounded himself mostly with like-minded young men to help him run the forum with less than mature and respectful methods. He did however, bring in some mature, well spoken mods to help him out and for awhile, they managed to keep things civil and keep the forum growing.

Over time, though, even they had had enough and were ready to break away and begin their own herp forum. At the same time, the original owner was bored and wanting to move on to something else, so....the small group of mods bought him out and "Admin Council" became the new owners of BP.net. But why did we do that? Because we felt that despite the unlikely beginnings, BP.net had developed into a site that was truly different from any other herp site out there. A site who's mission was not to promote those already deeply into the hobby, but to help and nurture those just wanting to get into it. A site where confused new snake owners could come and learn just how ignorant pet store employees really were (for instance), and learn how to give their animals environments they could thrive in.

Throughout the years, there have been ups and downs even among the original Admin Council. But the central core of it has remained the same. We have gathered a staff of mods who feel just as passionately about the mission of BP.net...people who love to help others learn and grow in the hobby...people who genuinely care about the wellbeing of these often misunderstood animals and are willing to put much, if not all, of their own spare time into making sure people and animals thrive together.

Why are the members here? Over the years, BP.net has grown tremendously, and continues to grow at an unprecedented pace. Many, many people sign up in order to make full use of our features, without ever actually participating in the threads. But even if we don't see them...they are here...reading the vast wealth of information available here and learning how best to care for their animals. And many of our members enjoy participating in the public threads...either asking questions and getting reassurances...or answering questions and giving reassurances. Most of our members are either Seekers or Givers. And frequently, over time, the Seekers become Givers. And all of you spend the hours and hours of your time here because you care. You care about the animals involved, and you care about the people who love them.

So why can't we all just get along??? Because we're human. And when humans interact with each other in large numbers over long spans of time...disagreements are bound to pop up. With our membership growing as fast as it is...it stands to reason that we will get a few "bad apples" that try and insinuate themselves into our community and then proceed to attempt to spoil the whole barrel. But most of the time...it is only a matter of occassional members appearing to be "bad apples" because they don't express themselves in some sort of "acceptable" manner. Maybe they don't have the same skill-set of communcation and social graces that the majority of members have. That doesn't make them bad people. But it certainly does cause friction. And this friction is just part of normal life, folks. And the more this forum grows...the more of this friction we're going to see and have to deal with.

The staff (admins and mods alike) are here to keep things running as smoothly as possible. We've created a comprehensive list of rules and TOS that we feel it reasonable for members to abide by. We do our best to enforce those rules. But we can't stop humans from being...human. We can't make everyone "be nice" all the time. We can't force certain individuals to "get along" when they are not inclined to do so. If people are going to participate in a public forum of this nature, they have to be prepared to be disagreed with....and perhaps even "not liked." Members who wish to fit in with this community and "get along" with everyone make a concerted effort to do so. Those who refuse to make any effort at getting along will stick out like a sore thumb...and there's really nothing the staff can do about that except make sure things stay within the bounderies of the TOS/Rules.

There were no "glory days." At any given point in the history of this site, there has been drama and disagreements and bitterness. Because it's human. And Heaven help us....I would prefer for us to stay human. Despite the friction and spite and drama that it causes....it also allows us to shine forth with respect and compassion...to a degree that few Internet Forums will ever come close to reaching.

:clap: very well said judy :hug:

now i know why we're here:D

Starting and causing drama on the internet is rather sad and if you can't take someone's advice no matter how sarcastic or just don't right rude, then don't post, people. We need to remember just 'cause you think one way, doesn't mean everyone thinks the same way. So let's enjoy the site for what it is and lets keep drama out of a site for snakes. Snakes don't cause drama so lets learn something from them. Just be cool and don't be a hot head.

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Originally Posted by Vomitore

Starting and causing drama on the internet is rather sad and if you can't take someone's advice no matter how sarcastic or just don't right rude, then don't post, people. We need to remember just 'cause you think one way, doesn't mean everyone thinks the same way. So let's enjoy the site for what it is and lets keep drama out of a site for snakes. Snakes don't cause drama so lets learn something from them. Just be cool and don't be a hot head.

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well said.most of the time i dont think like everyone else or agree with everyone else,but when it comes to snakes i take the advice whether i need it or not for future reference.

Great post Judy. That should be stickied and posted into any thread were some overly excited arguement takes place.

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Originally Posted by daniel1983

Great post Judy. That should be stickied and posted into any thread were some overly excited arguement takes place.

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Agreed and pmed to the people the mod or admin thinks is causing all the trouble.

Good job Judy.

We go through these spirts where we get a lot of this and then it just dies out..

Agreed awesome post! I wanted to qoute you on it and post it in the leucistic thread :) but... It disappeared...


Let's keep this place positive!

:gj:

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Originally Posted by Vomitore

Starting and causing drama on the internet is rather sad and if you can't take someone's advice no matter how sarcastic or just don't right rude, then don't post, people. We need to remember just 'cause you think one way, doesn't mean everyone thinks the same way. So let's enjoy the site for what it is and lets keep drama out of a site for snakes. Snakes don't cause drama so lets learn something from them. Just be cool and don't be a hot head.

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Wonderful post :)

Judy excellent post!. Obviously ther are always going to be negative comments and reactions. What troubles me is that some people are drawn to the negativity like a shark feeding frenzy and it escalates to way beyond the original attack and sides are drawn, peoples opinions attacked etc..! The recent drama made me think we should have an arguement category in the forum for those who thrive on attacking one another. That way those who aren't interested in fighting don't need to pay attention to the school yard drama. I myself have had some negative comments or reactions directed towards me and did not respond defensively because I'm not interested in fighting with a mere misunderstanding. Some times we just need to turn the other cheek and move on!

I think that thread was a culmination of other issues that were present before that thread started, and all the arguing brought it all out to the front.

I would say confidently that was the ugliest thread on BP.net that I have ever seen. Or at least right up there with some of the MG threads in the inquiries section.

B-E-A...Utiful Thread Judy! And very true... Well said! :sunny:

Right on and well said!

Wow guess I'm kind of glad I was too busy lately and missed all the drama in that thread (which lucky enough I never even got the chance to open before it went poof LOL).

Beautifully said Judy. In the end, we're here for the shared experience of owning snakes and other herps. Being humans we are, of course, going to muck that up with egos, turf wars, cliques, drama and all that silly crapola...that's just humans being humans. On the upside we can also show a wonderful generousity of spirit and giving that sometimes takes my breath away.

The garbage generally passes thank goodness and we always seem to get back to the good stuff that makes BPNet one of the greatest herp sites online. :)

You're so eloquent, Judy. Excellent post. :)

OK, I'll say it.... What Drama??? I frequent quite a number of forums and this one is probably one of the most low key ones I've been to. Disagreements are going to happen in any group where people have opinions. Fights are going to break out in any group where people have strong opinions.


I apparently missed the thread that brought about this one and I'm sorry to see it gone, though I'm sure the moderators had good reason to pull it. I just get concerned over things like that after years of reading kingsnake where threads often get pulled over the most trivial and ridiculous of reasons.

trust me mark, we don't pull threads for trivial or ridiculous reasons. ;)

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trust me mark, we don't pull threads for trivial or ridiculous reasons

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Ok, I'll trust you. I just haven't been around long enough to get a good feel for the place and when I hear of threads being pulled I immediatly think of Kingsnake and their totalitarian rules.

The beginning of that thread had some good info in it......could you have not just removed the posts after everything went downhill? Just wondering.....I'm not sure how the mod software works.....

E- fighting is the shiznit

Nah it is the lamesness of keyboard-induced steroids and false bravado - not debating mind you - that is a completely different animal than the hystrionics that follow "drama". Personal attacks and levying of judgements and unnecessary escalation of animosities are what make the drama nasty.


A good debate - even a good argument - is a constructive thing by the content and nature of it's exchanges. When it devolves into ad-hominem attacks etc - it's just sad and more than counter-productive.


unless by e-fighting you meant something like Battlefield2142 . . . in which case i concur, sir.

Judy,
Not sure what thread you mean and hopefully I missed it, that being said,

God Love ya !


And Smulkin,
Very well said sir, indeed.

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Originally Posted by jotay

Judy,
Not sure what thread you mean and hopefully I missed it.

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The thread has been restored with the mods (specifically Daniel) deleting out the posts that took the thread downhill. See http://www.ball-pythons.net/forums/s...5&page=1&pp=10

How could such an innocent thread gone so wrong ???

Oh well........Time to move on to better and more positive things!

here here... moving on and moving forward.

i'd like to take a moment to share something with everyone. i think it would be so great if, instead of us looking at new members through a skeptic lense, if we instead gave them the benefit of the doubt and welcomed them with open arms. :hug: assisting them in whatever way we can... leaving the "troll" remarks out of the threads and instead prescribing to the adage "if you have nothing nice to say, say nothing at all".

if you honestly feel the person is NOT on the up and up... then ignore the thread. don't post... just ignore them.

i realize it would be nice if all new members took the time to think about what they are posting and what they really want to say instead of typing up a message which is not well spoken and does not tell the whole story of what it is they really want/need to say but we can't control their actions... we can only control our own.

so in the future... if you don't have anything nice to say... feel free to pass that thread... and find another where you do have quality to share (verses quantity of posts).

thanks for listening and i now return you to your regularly scheduled surfing. ;)

damn....nice post

thanks ryan, i just hope people read it and remember what it was like when they were the new kid in the sand box... wishing someone would look at them, make eye contact and offer a shovel so they could join in and make something cool too.

:hug:

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Originally Posted by recycling goddess

so in the future... if you don't have anything nice to say... feel free to pass that thread... and find another where you do have quality to share (verses quantity of posts).

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Oh man... that deserves a rep point... Can mods receive rep points? I dont' know but I'm sure as heck going to try to give it! ;)

Personally I love this site. I know that there are a few rotten moments, but overall I get a positive feel for this place; I enjoy advising people, getting advice from others and pics of course. Some people have an inflammatory way of coming across, or maybe their words are either taken wrong, or truly are out of line.. I think that the mods do a great job of weeding out the pests and making sure no one bites someone else's head off too much though; I look at this site as a little time for me to relax and enjoy people who love and keep these awesome snakes first and foremost; it is the tie that binds us though there are so many different types of people here!! My friends at the water cooler at work, or my mom on the phone, just aren't as fun to talk BPs with as you guys/gals. :)

Unfortunately, the sanitizing of threads lets the perpetrators of the BS continue on as if nothing happened. I for one won't forget it, regardless if the deletion causes others to. I love the site but sometimes people who act stupid need to be told so. Take it as you like.

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Originally Posted by jglass38

Unfortunately, the sanitizing of threads lets the perpetrators of the BS continue on as if nothing happened. I for one won't forget it, regardless if the deletion causes others to.

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I agree 100%